Scattered Debris
by ohmytheon
Summary: When their headquarters in Ishval is destroyed with Roy inside, Riza struggles with her refusal to give up on Roy being alive and whether or not she can complete their work without him as Havoc attempts to help her.
**Author's Notes:** This ran away from me. It wasn't supposed to be anywhere this big, but I couldn't get to the line of the prompt, so I just had to keep writing. Also, you know me: I love writing Riza and Havoc being friends and having each other's back. The prompt was Roy/Riza + "You need to wake up because I can't do this without you."

 **Disclaimer:** I own nothing.

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 **Scattered Debris**

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The first thing that Riza woke up to was the smell of blood, its metallic, tangy taste hanging thick in the air mixed with clouds of dust. She buried her face in the sleeve of her jacket and coughed horribly, feeling as if her entire mouth was filled with dirt. The next thing she noticed was the pain in her side and leg. Her side throbbed dully but consistently while her leg flared with sharp pains any time she tried to move. Noise came next as her vision swam before her, screams and sirens wailing distantly.

Riza furrowed her brow. That didn't make any sense. They were right in the middle of the makeshift town that they'd set up as their camp in Ishval. It was small and more ramshackle than a town, but it was crammed with people. Why was there so much dust in the air? Why was she in pain? Why did the air taste like blood?

Her heart began to beat wildly in her chest. No, the War of Extermination had ended over a decade ago. Or had it? Had everything just been a wild dream? Was she coming back to in her tent? Had their station been attacked while she was asleep? She scrambled for her weapon, ignoring the pain, and was confused when she found a handgun instead of her rifle. Her eyes widened as she looked down at the blue uniform she was wearing and not the white coat that she normally wore when on missions. There was so much sand and blood. This was the War; she had to be in Ishval. What was going on? Was this a night terror?

"Captain Hawkeye!" a voice called out in the distance from somewhere in the smoke and dust. Captain? No, she was a cadet. Why were they calling her that? She blinked heavily as she tried to pinpoint the source, but everything felt so foggy. Her mind couldn't latch onto anything. She kept flittering between crushing panic, confusion, and pain. What had happened? Someone fell to her side. "Captain, are you conscious?"

Using all the strength in her mind, Riza focused on two words: "What… happened?" Talking hurt, but not terribly. It hurt about just as much to breath.

"What do you think you're doing, Sergeant? Get a medic!" another voice, a familiar man's voice, snapped. She felt hands on her, carefully rolling her onto her back, and was unable to stop herself from yelping when her leg was jostled. "Shit, Riza, I think your leg is broken." A gentle hand went to her side and she could feel the person sigh in relief, his body moving hers. "Maybe a rib or two broken as well, but no deep gashes or wounds. You're lucky."

Finally, Riza's vision stopped swimming and fading on her and she was able to focus on the person speaking. Staring down at her was Jean Havoc. His face was covered in dirt with a few scrapes marring his face and it looked as if his white shirt was singed, his military jacket nowhere to be seen. There was a crooked grin on his face, but she thought it looked painfully strained. When she opened her mouth to question him, sound came crashing full strength into her ears again, causing her to flinch and close her eyes.

Everything was so loud. People were screaming, some were crying, both in Amestrian and Ishvalan. She thought she could hear orders being given, but it was hard to distinguish over the sound of the sirens and people stomping on the hard-packed sand.

Suddenly it all came back to her - why she was lying in pain in the middle of a dust cloud.

Riza tried to push herself out of Havoc's lap. "We were attacked-"

Barely moving a muscle, Havoc easily was able to keep her down. "Lay still; I don't know the extent of your injuries." He didn't even bother to raise his voice and didn't have a firm grip on her. She glowered at him, but he ignored it. "How someone was able to get a rocket launcher out here, I've no idea…"

"The General?"

Havoc looked away.

This time, when Riza fought to push herself up, Havoc had a more difficult time trying to keep her down. "Let go of me, Lieutenant."

"Riza, you're in no condition to-"

"Let go of me, Jean!" Riza snapped, shoving his hands away from her. He flinched, but stopped trying to stop her and watched as she attempted to pull herself up. Her leg was no doubt broken, though she thought that she could still put a bit of weight on it. Using a jeep that she'd fallen next to, she tried to get to her feet, but it was difficult with the pain in her side. She collapsed back to the ground.

"See? You're hurt. You need medical attention." Havoc scooted to her side. "Let the others search for it."

Riza stared into Havoc's eyes, allowing him to see just how much pain she was in. She didn't like it - she hated admitting any sort of weakness - but she knew it would be the one thing to convince Havoc otherwise. She didn't let other people in often and when she did, never to the full extent. But she couldn't just sit here while Roy was out there somewhere, injured, possibly unconscious, hurt… She couldn't. She felt like her heart was running a marathon and her mind was screaming at her. She was supposed to protect him. She should've been there at his side.

"If you're so concerned about my injuries, then help me look for him," Riza told him. She dug her hands into the dirt, not caring at the way it chipped at her nails. "Please."

Havoc took a deep breath and then stood up. It was much easier to get on her feet with Havoc helping her up. He threw one arm around her and under her arm so that she could walk and another on her other elbow. She hissed in pain a little when she went to move her leg, but with Havoc holding her up on that side, it was easier to move. She gave him a grateful nod and then they started to walk through the dust cloud.

It was…more chaos than she expected. Judging from the prone bodies on the ground, some of them not entirely complete anymore, she had been lucky. She'd seen too much devastation and horror from her first time in Ishval and later on during the fight with the Homunculus and Father to feel nauseous at the sight, but that didn't leave her feeling any easier. She didn't have time to mourn as she saw fellow soldiers lying dead on the ground or when she heard an Ishval woman crying over the body of who had most likely been her husband. She had to remain focused on the task and it took a lot in her to ignore the pain besides. Havoc, for his part, didn't turn his head or even blink as they walked to their destination.

Riza gasped in shock when she saw the remains of the building they'd set up as their command. It had taken weeks to construct, using the combination of alchemy and construction workers. Armstrong had really outdone himself here, manipulating his alchemy to create rather than to destroy. It hadn't been a beautiful building by any means, but it had been something and it was better than the large tent they'd used in the meantime.

And in less than a minute, it had been completely destroyed. Or rather, at least half of it had been. The stone building looked as if a giant had stepped on it, the roof mostly caved in and the south and west walls gone, leaving a giant gaping hole so that one could see right into the building. It strangely reminded Riza of Elicia's old dollhouse, the one that she could split in half and open up so that she could play in the separate rooms. A Corporal even stood in shock on the second floor of a room that had just barely gone untouched, her hands over her mouth and her eyes staring blankly at the rubble that had been the first floor just moments ago.

"He was in the building," Riza said in a detached voice.

Havoc eyed her, but said nothing about her tone. "His office?"

After Riza nodded her head, they started forward. There were already multiple people digging through the debris in an attempt to find any survivors. They made their way to what she thought was where his office had once been located and started to dig themselves. Havoc carefully lowered her down and began to search. He most likely knew that she couldn't do much, not in her condition, but he wisely let her be. It made her feel better to be her herself, digging her way through the rubble until her fingers were bleeding, tossing loose rocks away. Every now and then, when someone shouted that they found someone, her heart leaped into her throat, but it was never him and she would look away.

As the hour passed, Riza couldn't help but feel like she was drowning in the rubble. She had to find him. He had to be okay. They'd pull back the rocks and find that he was hiding in some sort of pocket, probably with another person that he'd stupidly tried to save. He'd be banged up and a little worse for wear, but would come to with a grin on his face and ask what took them so long. He was okay. He was alive. There could be no other outcome.

"Riza," Havoc sighed, putting a hand on her shoulder. "We really need to get you looked at-"

"No, not without the General."

Havoc bit his lip. "If he's still under there, the lack of oxygen…"

Riza rounded on him and shoved him so hard that he nearly tripped over a rock and fell on his ass. "How dare you say that?" she yelled, tears blurring her eyes. She refused to think like that. He was alive. They would find him. She would find him! How could Havoc even say such things? How could he give up so easily? Had the General not surprised them before? Had he not nearly died so many times and come back to them? To her? "I'm not leaving him!"

"You're only hurting yourself further!" Havoc snapped back this time, more upset than angry. "He wouldn't want you doing this to yourself! He'd want you to get medical attention and heal so that you can keep working-"

"I can't!" Riza tried to breathe, but it hurt so much. She swiped at her eyes, furious with herself for allowing herself to get so worked up emotionally. One of the rescuers, a Warrant Officer, looked at her curiously, but then glanced away when she shot him a glare. She looked back down at the rubble, picking up a rock. "I can't… I can't do this without him, Jean. I don't know how. I need to find him."

"C'mon, Riza," Havoc said as he kneeled down in front of her. "I know you better than that and so does he. You're stronger than that - than him - than all of us."

Riza shook her head as tears splashed onto the rock in her hand. "I'm not…not without him…"

"We've got something!" someone shouted. She didn't even bother to look up. It wasn't him. It was never him. What was she supposed to do without him? They were supposed to fix things together. She was supposed to help him to the top so he could reach his goals, so they could do better, be more, deserve something. "It doesn't look like a part of the structure of the building."

"What is it?"

"It kind of looks like…a box? Made of stone?"

"Look at the markings. This was made with alchemy!"

Riza perked up at the sound of that last word. There were no other alchemists here besides Roy since he had sent Armstrong to a town further south a week ago. That meant that the only person that could've done anything with alchemy here was Roy himself. She scrambled to get to her feet, failing and only managing to scrape her legs and hands on the debris. Havoc mumbled for her to calm down as he helped her up again. They staggered forward, tired and physically beaten. She hadn't even asked Havoc about his own injuries. Distantly she wondered if he had been afraid of losing his ability to walk again, but she didn't have the focus to ask him that now.

Instead they watched as people used hammers to break into the stone box. Indeed, she saw the telltale signs of alchemy, something that Edward had taught her to look for due to his own alchemy abilities. Roy had learned those same abilities after he had been forced through the Gate. He couldn't do nearly as much as Edward had been able to or Alphonse now, but with a little luck and knowledge of his training during his apprenticeship with her father…

"There's someone in there!" one man shouted after peering inside. "No, a few people! Hurry it up, people! This turned into a hotbox in this sun!"

Unable to lift a hammer, Riza was left to watch in a fevered daze as others broken down the walls. Once the hole was large enough, two men clambered halfway in and began to drag people out. There were two women, one Ishvalan and the other Lieutenant Colonel Hartwin. A small Ishvalan boy was carried out next. Riza noted with her exhausted eyes that all of them were bloodied, but they were breathing as well, even if they were unconscious.

"It's him! We've got him!"

Riza's heart jumped into her throat and she held her breath, but when she saw the two men carrying a bloodied and bruised Roy Mustang out into the open, she couldn't stop herself from crying out if she'd tried. "General!" She and Havoc rushed forward, stumbling as they hurried, as Roy was carried away from the debris of the building and laid on a blood-spotted carrier. Immediately a medic ran over to them, equally covered in blood. By the time they reached his side, she was already thoroughly examining him.

"Is he-?" Riza couldn't speak any further.

Roy looked so bad. He was pale, most likely from blood loss, and there was a gash on his head, most likely from when the debris began to collapse on top of him. He hadn't had enough time to cover himself before being injured, most likely because he'd attempted to save everyone in the room with him. He was quick, but not as quick as a rocket hitting a building. Sweat drenched his tattered clothes, having been stuck in the stone box for over an hour, and he was caved in mud that had once been dry dirt and dust.

The medic wiped her bangs off her sweat-drenched forehead, smearing a bit of Roy's blood on her face in the process, and sat back on her haunches. "He's alive, breathing a little shallowly, but that's to be expected. He looks worse than he is, I think. The head would bled freely, but it doesn't look deep and it clotted on its own. He needs cleaned and stitched up so the wounds don't get infected, but honestly…" She ran her fingers through her ratted hair. "It's a miracle that he wasn't killed considering where he was. That alchemy box saved his and everyone else's lives."

As the medic got up, she watched Riza for a moment as she collapsed to her knees at Roy's side. After making a quick decision, the medic dragged Havoc to his feet and had him follow her to help move the unconscious injured people to the tents. Anyone that could walk and carry were needed to do so. That left Riza on her own with Roy. She weakly picked up one of his hands with two of hers and held it close to her heart, as if feeling her heartbeat might bring him back to consciousness.

"General, I…"

No, that wasn't right. She wanted to apologize to him for not being there, but she couldn't get herself to say the words. No doubt before he'd lost consciousness, Roy had been grateful that Riza hadn't been in the building, but he probably would have wondered if she'd been in the blast zone. He'd sent her to deliver some papers so that they could be mailed back to Central. That small building had remained untouched. She'd been walking back when the rocket had hit.

Leaning over him, Riza clutched his hand against her chest and laid her head on his chest. In this moment, she didn't care if it looked inappropriate. She needed to be close to him, to breathe in his familiar scent, to feel his chest rise and fall as he breathed. She needed him to open his eyes, to capture her with his gaze and reassure her that things were okay. It felt like watching him collapse after his fight with Lust all over again. How many times would this man put her through such hell of watching him nearly die?

"General… I can't…" Riza closed her eyes and willed the tears to stop. Why was he so good at reducing her to tears? It was unbecoming and she hated it. She hated how he was able to wring every, little emotion out of her - how he could make her feel so warm with a smile, loved with a light touch on the small of her back, furious with a quirk of his eyebrows, flustered with a smirk, terrified by his unexpected absence. She hated it and never wanted to lose it. "Roy, you need to wake up because I can't do this without you. I won't. I refuse."

"Roy…I like the way you say that…"

Jerking herself upright, Riza gawked as Roy's eyes slowly fluttered open. He seemed just as dazed as she had been when she'd come to earlier, but was able to focus on her quicker than she'd done with Havoc. A small smile wound its way onto his face as he gazed up at her, squeezing her hands with the one that she held.

"Tears again, Hawkeye? I've never…known a woman to cry over me so much."

Riza gave him a watery smile in return. "I've gotten used to working under your particular brand of laziness, sir. I'd hate to learn someone else's." When Roy moved to sit up, it was Riza's turn to push him back down. Her leg was beginning to hurt like hell, but she didn't want him to know just yet the extent of her injuries, not when he'd just come out of it. He'd berate her later. She didn't care about that right now. "You scared me."

"Apologies." He paused and closed his eyes as she ran her fingers through his hair. It was a soothing action that she knew would convince him to lie still. "You could do this without me, you know."

"No, I couldn't," Riza told him lightly, "and besides, I don't want to."

Roy snorted. "Stubborn."

"Haven't I always been?" Riza asked. "I've stuck with you all these years, after all."

Humming to himself, Roy let himself be taken away from her touch, but he threaded his fingers into one of her hands so that they were holding onto one another. He was alive; he was with her. Just as the way the world should be. She could live with this.


End file.
